First Time
by Adia7
Summary: After the infarction, Wilson and House share a rarely open moment just before Wilson makes his first in a neverending series of allowances for his damaged friend. This story contains slight spoilers for Three Stories.


DISCLAIMER: The characters and situations herein belong to FOX and David Shore. No profit was made from this story.

James Wilson hadn't gone home. He was going to catch it from Rachel when he finally got there, but that realization wouldn't hit for two more days. For the past seven years, he has run through these hallways from his office to a patient's room, the cafeteria to his office, and today from his car to ICU. In the depressing yellow light shining from the fluorescent overheads, House looked like a corpse. His grey face was contorted, twisted like the human pretzel they'd seen on Cirque du Soleil, and his elegant fingers, the fingers that could tease any song out of the most out of tune piano, were twisted whitely around the regulation knit blanket. Beneath the thin gown, his chest convulsed with every breath.

Wilson felt like he'd been plunged headfirst into a vat of ice water. For the first time ever, he did not know how to react to his best friend—and God, how selfish could one person be? He took a deep breath, swallowing a lungful of ice water that froze his vocal chords so that he could barely choke out one word: "Greg."

House's eyes ticked to the door, icicle blue melting into pink puddles. How long had he been swallowing tears? "James," he said, but it wasn't his voice. It was Mr. Timmerman's moan, Mike Donnelly's keening sobs, Rabbi Levinson's choking conversations on that last snowy night in February.

Not remotely reassured, Wilson dropped his practical, small suitcase, and he ran across the room. Ran. Until he was leaning over the bed, staring at the twisted body that had once trounced him at any sport that ever existed. House's fingers knotted around the fine material of Wilson's sleeve, and he choked so violently on a stifled sob that the hot exhalation assured the younger doctor that, if barely, House was alive. "I'm so sorry," he said against House's neck. Now that he had started, he couldn't stop. The words that had been repeating in his mind poured from his lips: "I'm sorry, I'm sorry I wasn't here, I left as soon as Stacy called, but she didn't call until you were already… in surgery… I'm sorry, I'm so—"

"Shut up," House tried to snap, but his voice caught in the back of his throat and rasped unimpressively. "Don't be an idiot."

Wilson pulled back and tried to ignore the warmth where House's fingers had chafed the material of his suit. He slid onto the plastic chair next to the bed and dry-scrubbed his face. "I…I…I missed two weeks of _General Hospital. _You'll have to catch me up." It was weak, but he had to try for normalcy.

"I haven't really been able to watch," House admitted. "Stacy's taping it." There was a long pause. "Did you get any in Tokyo?"

"I'm married."

"And you were in a country where they sell used panties in vending machines, so I repeat, did you get any?"

Wilson shook his head. "Did you know Rowan Chase was going to be there? That rheumatologist from Prague? You read his book a couple months ago."

"Self-important asshole," House snorted.

"Yeah, who does that remind you of?" Wilson teased before moving to the point of his story. House loved stories that involved Wilson wishing violence on people. "He said something about his kid wasting time in seminary—I don't even remember exactly what, but I almost punched his face in."

"Woulda paid to see that."

"You would have done it."

"That's me," House said. "Greg House, nephrologist, immunologist, and defender of mini-priests everywh—Oh, God, oh Christ, Jesus…" His hands fell to the morphine drip beside his bed, and he pushed it once, twice… He sobbed brokenly, one word, "James..." Not Wilson, not Jimmy, not Doogie—James. A single tear eked out of Greg's right eye and slid slowly down his pallid cheek.

"You're maxed out," Wilson said softly.

"I'm a doctor!"

"I don't think—"

"And _you're _a doctor! If I have another MI—"

"You had a heart attack?" Wilson shouted. He was going to kill Stacy for not calling him three days ago. Honestly, just take his car and drive it over her, back up over her unconscious, broken body, and then step on her face until she was dead. House would love to hear about that. "Greg!"

Greg just screamed continuously, like ice breaking over a frozen river. His eyes knit shut, and his fingers twisted on the top of the blanket.

Wilson reached into his pocket and pulled out the small gold key that every attending had. He inserted it in the machine beside House's bed and turned it. Punching in his code, he raised the amount of morphine allowed. Hurriedly, he pressed the button, and a dose of narcotics flowed through the plastic tubing and into House's arm. His fingers released the blanket in stages. His eyes opened halfway. "Thank you," House rasped.

"Sure," Wilson answered. He saw the quickly concealed panic flit across House's face as he rose, so he casually said, "I'm going to mark your chart."

Wilson marked the chart quickly and returned to the chair. House snatched his friend's hand so tightly that it was just short of painful. "Don't leave."

"I just gave you an overdose of morphine. I'm not going anywhere."

"James, no," House said, obviously struggling to keep his eyes open through the haze of narcotics and nausea sweeping over his dissected body. "Don't. Leave."

Wilson froze and tightened his fingers around House's. Without a thought to propriety or rumors started by the nosy nurse who had walked past three times, he brought the hand to his mouth and kissed it. "Not going anywhere," Wilson promised. "You don't have to worry."

As House's eyes closed the rest of the way, Wilson ran his thumb over his friend's knuckles. The hand in his was powerful. It was solid, it was strong—it was there. That was all it had to be, Wilson realized. As long as House existed, it was enough for him. He would organize, compromise, worry about everything, as long as House continued to exist. It was a resolution that would haunt Wilson, like little white pills between the couch cushions, a purple smear on a pale jaw, and a stinking pile of vomit on the floor where he'd collapsed on his first night back home.

Any reviews or constructive criticism will be appreciated.


End file.
